HARVEY

Brave New World In the Context of Racism and Racial Awareness
__**Introduction**__ “Remember in 1619, when Africans were ripped from their homeland by Europeans, and taken against their will to work as slaves in America? Nearly three centuries later, after slavery had been abolished, black people were still seen as second-class citizens, by their white counterparts, especially in the American South. Race based propaganda, black codes, and Jim Crow laws created a caste system that is still upheld today in some parts of the Deep South. Race riots and civil rights protests were broadcast all over the world. However, what most people forget is that without the slave ships manufactured in England, none of this would not have been possible. Thank Ford, they have forgotten!” A roar of laughter went up from the ten World-Controllers as Mustapha Mond finished. “Besides,” one of his colleagues added. “‘History is bunk,’ so none of this matters. All that is relevant now is “COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, STABILITY.” And, that is all that we will ever educate the masses. We will forever hide all of the old writings, films, and anything else that could expose the horrors of our history!” He finished with a dull smirk on his face. The men chuckled. “Without knowledge of the past,” a third Controller began, “who of them can know that they are actually in an updated, more scientifically advanced version of slavery? (here you seem to be inventing a hypothetical conversation, a fiction - this is not suitable for traditional academic research writing) Psychologically enslaved by their conditioning and continued brainwashing; mentally enslaved by the “stabilizing” effects of soma…” they were amused by his use of air quotes, “and more importantly, physically enslaved by the encouraged segregation of the castes. And, the most brilliant part is. . . none of them even know the concept of freedom!” They all burst into a laughter that was louder than the first. But, as the effects of their soma tablets began to wear off, their conversation began weighing heavy on their consciences. “//Enslavement?”// they thought. //“Is that what we’re doing here?”// The silence was deafening.

In a society where films like //Birth of a Nation// and meaningful works of art like the Shakespearean play Othello, are unseen and unanalyzed by the oppressed masses, (both works are well known and carefully analyzed) there is no doubt that their will be repeated consequences much like those seen in the American South. The corruption, racism, and oppression seen in the southern states of the United States of America would have been exponentially worse, had there been the medical, technological, and scientific advances of //Brave New World.// More importantly, although Huxley's imaginary World State does not seem to promote racism on the surface, closer examination of the text suggests otherwise.

**__"Only in Othello's words could he find an adequate vehicle for his contempt"__** To the untrained eye, it would seem that the most important quote from Shakespearean literature in //Brave New World// is that from which the title is taken: "O, wonder! / How many goodly creatures are there here! / How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, / That has such people in't!" (//The Tempest//, V, i) However, with closer examination of the text, and with an eye towards finding the hidden implications of racism and racial awareness, one may assert that the quotes and references to Shakespeare's Othello, are equally, if not, more important.

In Chapter 11, after John and Lenina had returned to their respective homes after the feely film at the Alhambra, Huxley places John alone in his room. He takes out "from its hiding-place" his Shakespeare book and "began to read Othello." (Huxley, 157) **It was at this point that** John was said to think of the "gigantic negro" in the film, as "the hero of //Three Weeks in a Helicopter.//" (Huxley, 157) "A black man" was the specific phrase used to when the connection between the fictional two characters were made. It is from this moment of down-time in John Savage's life, that one might assert that he identifies more with people of color than those of his own race. Also, it is important to note that, back on the Savage Reservation, all John wanted was to be accepted by the native peoples there, whom Huxley described to have "dark brown bodies" and faces "black, like a mask of obsidian." (Huxley Hypertext, Chapter 7)

In chapter 13, as Lenina attempted to throw herself upon John Savage, he began instantly to quote Othello, as he “shook her. “Whore!” he shouted. “Whore! Impudent strumpet!” (Huxley, 177) As he makes his first reference to adultery, quoting a number of stanzas from //King Lear//, John Savage:

. . . was striding up and down, marching, marching to the drums and music of magical words. The wren goes to't and the small gilded fly does lecher in my sight." Maddeningly they rumbled in his ears. “The fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't with a more riotous appetite. Down from the waist they are Centaurs, though women all above. But to the girdle do the gods inherit. Beneath is all the fiend's. There's hell, there's darkness, there is the sulphurous pit, burning scalding, stench, consumption; fie, fie, fie, pain, pain! Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary, to sweeten my imagination. (Huxley, 177-78)

This reference to adultery is significant because in //Othello//, the tragic hero, Othello, is married to a white woman. Othello, a black man, is the Venetian Army General, and has power over numerous white people (or, people of European descent). In the play, one of Othello’s closest officers betrays him, and successfully tricks him into thinking that his white wife, Desdemona, is a “whore” or “strumpet.” The fact that John Savage thinks of Lenina as Othello thinks of his wife, suggests that he sees himself much like an outsider that is in love with someone that is of the social norm. Although they were in no way exclusively committed to one another, and more importantly, since "marriage" was unheard of in the society of the World State, John's reference to Lenina as a whore shows primarily, his refusal to accept the promiscuity encouraged in this "brave new world," and secondly, **how deeply his readings of //Othello, King Lear,// and //Romeo and Juliet// had influenced his conceptions of intimate relationships** (especially, since he had never been in one b efore). Moreover, these references to the play //Othello//, and all of his many other references to it throughout the novel, insinuate that Huxley portrayed John Savage as a white man that identifies with 'the lone black man in a white world,' not only in his references to this play, but also when he sees the feely film with Lenina.

__**//Three Weeks In A Helicopter// Turned "'Birth of A' //Brave New World"//**__

The most important scene in Huxley's novel in reference to race relations in the //Brave New World// is that of the feely film. Chapter 11 of the novel brings light to the issue, that otherwise could have easily gone unnoticed. When analyzing the feely, one must first step outside of the novel, and remember when in the history of feature film this book was written. **Brave New World (1932) was written by a British man only eight years after the release of D.W. Griffith's //Birth of A Nation// (1915) in America.** References by researchers and analysts as both "notorious" and "a masterpiece" this film is the epitome, if not the direct source for, Huxley's //Three Weeks In A Helicopter.//

In //Birth of A Nation//, which was used both as “anti-black propaganda” and "recruitment film" for the KKK, African Americans were portrayed as "happy loyal slaves or deranged rapists desperate for white women." The latter is much like what the "gigantic negro" was portrayed to be doing to the " golden-haired young brachycephalic Beta-Plus female" after he "fell on his head." (BMW Hypertext, Chapter 11) Much like the senopsis of the film described by Huxley as "extremely simple," //Birth of a Nation// also feature a rescue scene during its climax, which "showed a 'heroic' charge by the Ku Klux Klan to restore white Southerners to power" but, more importantly, to save the white woman who was at the time in the possession of an en-crazed mulatto man. ) This is almost identical to Huxley's conclusion of //Three Weeks in a Helicopter// which finished "Finally, after a whole series of adventures and much aerial acrobacy [as] three handsome young Alphas succeeded in rescuing her." (BMW Hypertext, Chapter 11) Both films "ended happily and decorously," with the white woman ending up with the white savior . (BMW Hypertext, Chapter 11)

John Savage, however, went on to call the film "horrible," "base," and "ignoble." (Huxley, 198) Later in a discussion with Mustapha Mond about the matter, "he made a grimace" at the thought of "the new [films which were] so stupid and horrible. Those plays, where there's nothing but helicopters flying about and you feel the people kissing." (Huxley, 198) He quoted Othello, and Huxley stated that "only in Othello's words could he find an adequate vehicle for his contempt." (Huxley, 198) He then went on to ask "Why don't you let them see //Othello// instead?" (Huxley, 198)

John's persistance to use //Othello// as a reference for solving all of his issues, **displays again his own personal identification with a black character, as opposed to white characters.** One could also assert that John identified with the "gigantic negro" in the feely film, which in turn lead him to pick up his Shakespeare book and turn to //Othello.// Huxley definitely continually portrayed John this way on purpose, so that he could be contrasted with characters like Mr. Foster in Chapter 1, as he expressed a sense of competition against the technicians working on the "negro ovary." Unlike John, Mr. Foster saw blacks as having "unfair advantages" insinuating that there had been some type of genetic superiority found in ovaries from people of color, that was better than the "European material" he was used to working with. (Huxley, 20)

In closing, it is important to notice that, without taking scenes like the feely film and the conversation with Mustapha Mond out of the context of Brave New World and putting it into the context of the real world during the time in which the book was written, a lot of the subtle racial comments can go unnoticed. With that said, it is now easy to say that Huxley's references to race in the novel were not simply a product of the times. These racial slurs were placed both carefully and intentionally, as to give some characters the idealistic characteristics of racists (i.e. Mustapha Mond, Mr. Foster, the Director) and others the ability to see past the color of their own skin (i.e. John the Savage).

WORD COUNT : 1774


 * //__Works Cited:__//**


 * Huxley, Aldous. //Brave New World and Brave New World Revisited//. New York: HarperCollins Publishers Inc., 2004. Print.
 * Huxley, Aldous. " BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley (1894-1963)." //BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley//. BLTC Research, 2008. Web. 4 Dec 2010. .
 * Shakespeare, William. King Lear, 1606
 * Shakespeare, William. Othello, 1603
 * Shakespeare, William. The Tempest, 1611

Works Referenced:
 * "List of quotes from Shakespeare in Brave New World." //Wikipedia//. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 01 Nov 2010. Web. 4 Dec 2010. .
 * SparkNotes Editors. “SparkNote on Othello.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2002. Web. 1 Dec. 2010.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

**1. Craemer, Thomas. "Racial Affect among African Americans and Non-African Americans. An Implicit "Dolls Test"" Paper presented at the annual meeting of the The ****Midwest Political Science Association, Palmer House Hilton, Chicago, Illinois, Apr 07, 2005 . 2010-11-29 ** **<http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p85594_index.html> **

//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">Good source with data charts, and investigated implicit racial affect among African American students. 28 pages. //

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">I used this source solely to get the old Clark data from 1947 experiments. Using the program Grab on my MacBook, I was able to abstract two pages from Creamer’s report (pp. 22-23) with the charted data from these experiments. This data shows relevance in the “class consciousness & sociology” and even “psychology and obedience.” The African American children studied showed preference for the white dolls, as opposed to black dolls. The children are comparable to the (debatably) uneducated members of the World State that have been psychologically brainwashed into thinking that they are better or worse than other members of society. Although this was a study on self-esteem, and the members of the World State show no signs of self-esteem let alone a sense of self, the most important comparison can be made between these children and the Deltas that refused to fight for freedom. Their conditioning, which can be likened to social class enslavement, if you will, left them obedient.

**<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">2. Cull, Nicholas John. "Birth of a Nation (1915)." Propaganda and mass persuasion : a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present. 1st ed. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, 2003. Print. **

//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">Great source. Reference to film and propaganda. 2 pages. //

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">This was a helpful short essay that summed up the movie Birth of a Nation, which can be easily compared to the feely film described in Chapter 11 of “Brave New World.” Cull points out interesting thoughts about how this film set the precedent for using film for persuasion. The book from which this article came from, Propaganda and mass persuasion : a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present, gives great insight on the use throughout its collection of articles. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">(also, WIKI-2.PDF)

**<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">3. Cull, Nicholas John. "Film (Feature)." Propaganda and mass persuasion : a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present. 1st ed. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, 2003. Print. **

//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">Great source. Reference to film and propaganda. 3 pages. //

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Film (Feature) gives details about how film has developed from the beginning of the 1900s until around the 1940s. It tells it's original intents (for whom and for what). More importantly, this article sheds lights on its implications; one of which being that it"is a wonderful medium for the propagandist." It states that no matter how good or bad the film was, it's "loaded with cultural propaganda for the country or society that produced it." This is comparable to Birth of A Nation and Brave New World. Birth of a Nation is even listed here as one of the "Notorious examples" that "transformed moviegoing in America." The people that were anxious to see his film were described as "the respectable sort" that "flocked to see his brilliant achievement." The author however, dug deeper into the film and dubbed it a "deeply flawed masterpiece." The article went on to talk about Nazi Germany and WWII propaganda films.

The house lights went down; fiery letters stood out solid and as though self-supported in the darkness. THREE WEEKS IN A HELICOPTER. AN ALL-SUPER-SINGING, SYNTHETIC-TALK1NG, COLOURED, STEREOSCOPIC FEELY. WITH SYNCHRONIZED SCENT-ORGAN ACCOMPANIMENT."Take hold of those metal knobs on the arms of your chair," whispered Lenina. "Otherwise you won't get any of the feely effects."

The Savage did as he was told. ** [obedience] ** Those fiery letters, meanwhile, had disappeared; there were ten seconds of complete darkness; then suddenly, dazzling and incomparably more solid-looking than they would have seemed in actual flesh and blood, far more real than reality, there stood the stereoscopic images, locked in one another's arms, of a gigantic negro and a golden-haired young brachycephalic Beta-Plus female. ** [gigantic negro was not given a caste classification -- like [|Washing Amazons.pdf], less than human] ** The Savage started. That sensation on his lips! He lifted a hand to his mouth; the titillation ceased; let his hand fall back on the metal knob; it began again. The scent organ, meanwhile, breathed pure musk. Expiringly, a sound-track super-dove cooed "Oo-ooh"; and vibrating only thirty-two times a second, a deeper than __African bass__ made answer: "Aa-aah." "Ooh-ah! Ooh-ah!" ** [monkey noises - again almost like the 'gigantic negro' was an ape -- debased; not human] ** the stereoscopic lips came together again, and once more the facial erogenous zones of the six thousand __spectators__ in the **Alhambra** tingled with almost intolerable galvanic pleasure. "Ooh …" The plot of the film was extremely simple. A few minutes after the first Oohs and Aahs (a duet having been sung and a little love made on that famous bearskin, every hair of which–the Assistant Predestinator was perfectly right–could be separately and distinctly felt), the negro had a helicopter accident, fell on his head. Thump! what a twinge through the forehead! A chorus of ow's and aie's went up from the audience.The concussion knocked all the negro's conditioning into a cocked hat. He developed for the Beta blonde an exclusive and maniacal passion. She protested. He persisted. There were struggles, pursuits, an assault on a rival, finally a sensational kidnapping. The Beta blond was ravished away into the sky and kept there, hovering, for three weeks in a wildly anti-social tête-à-tête with the black madman. Finally, after a whole series of adventures and much aerial acrobacy three handsome young Alphas succeeded in rescuing her. The negro was packed off to an Adult Re-conditioning Centre and the film ended happily and decorously, with the Beta blonde becoming the mistress of all her three rescuers. They interrupted themselves for a moment to sing a synthetic quartet, with full super-orchestral accompaniment and gardenias on the scent organ. Then the bearskin made a final appearance and, amid a blare of saxophones, the last stereoscopic kiss faded into darkness, the last electric titillation died on the lips like a dying moth that quivers, quivers, ever more feebly, ever more faintly, and at last is quiet, quite still. But for Lenina the moth did not completely die. Even after the lights had gone up, while they were shuffling slowly along with the crowd towards the lifts, its ghost still fluttered against her lips, still traced fine shuddering roads of anxiety and pleasure across her skin. Her cheeks were flushed. She caught hold of the Savage's arm and pressed it, limp, against her side. He looked down at her for a moment, pale, pained, desiring, and ashamed of his desire. He was not worthy, not … Their eyes for a moment met. What treasures hers promised! A queen's ransom of temperament. Hastily he looked away, disengaged his imprisoned arm. He was obscurely terrified lest she should cease to be something he could feel himself unworthy of.

__Quick Thoughts__ In 1915, //Birth of a Nation// was shown in theatres all over America, as “anti-black propaganda” (see reference) At first glance, all you see are the castes, not the races. All seem to be of one race. Therefore, you feel there is no racism. But going back to read it more closely, you find reference to a “negro ovary,” and a sense of racial competition that follows. And then you find that the Delta caste is black (as in of African descent). Finally we see the feely film and its likeness the //Birth of A Nation// which insinuates the racial awareness that Huxley continues to portray. · Deltas (black) had a riot – differences between this riot & race riots in South · the feely film was based off of Birth of a Nation – differences in the value of racism*

More references:


 * Without Sanctuary - article about lynchings. The word "spectator" is used in many senses. One to mean person watching, and two to describe the type of lynching when large crowds of whites would advertise and come from near and far to witness the burning, torture, mutilation and hanging of black people. (Usually black men accused of raping white women.) This can be likened to the feely film since Huxley uses the word spectator, when referring to the six thousand people in the Alhambra. He also uses the word again in BNW Revisited when discussing the use of subliminal messages in film.

GROUP PSYCHOLOGY. NO ENEMIES IN BNW.

UNIFYING, OUTSIDE THREAT. "FEAR OF THE OTHER, THE OUTSIDER" NONE IN BNW'S WOULD STATE -- UNTIL JOHN SAVAGE. INTERNAL THREAT - BERNARD

AM I DOING MORE THAN JUST REPORTING OR COMPARISON ?

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">1. Craemer, Thomas. "Racial Affect among African Americans and Non-African Americans. An Implicit "Dolls Test"" Paper presented at the annual meeting of the The ****<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Midwest Political Science Association, Palmer House Hilton, Chicago, Illinois, Apr 07, 2005 <Not Available>. 2010-11-29 **
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;"> <http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p85594_index.html> **

//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Good source with data charts, and <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">investigated implicit racial affect among African American students <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">. 28 pages. //

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">I used this source solely to get the old Clark data from 1947 experiments. Using the program Grab on my MacBook, I was able to abstract two pages from Creamer’s report (pp. 22-23) with the charted data from these experiments. This data shows relevance in the “class consciousness & sociology” and even “psychology and obedience.” The African American children studied showed preference for the white dolls, as opposed to black dolls. The children are comparable to the (debatably) uneducated members of the World State that have been psychologically brainwashed into thinking that they are better or worse than other members of society. Although this was a study on self-esteem, and the members of the World State show no signs of self-esteem let alone a sense of self, the most important comparison can be made between these children and the Deltas that refused to fight for freedom. Their conditioning, which can be likened to social class enslavement, if you will, left them obedient.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">2. Cull, Nicholas John. "Birth of a Nation (1915)." Propaganda and mass persuasion : a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present. 1st ed. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, 2003. Print. **

//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Great source. Reference to film and propaganda. 2 pages. //

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">This was a helpful short essay that summed up the movie Birth of a Nation, which can be easily compared to the feely film described in Chapter 11 of “Brave New World.” Cull points out interesting thoughts about how this film set the precedent for using film for persuasion. The book from which this article came from, Propaganda and mass persuasion : a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present, gives great insight on the use throughout its collection of articles. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">(also, WIKI-2.PDF)


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">3. Cull, Nicholas John. "Film (Feature)." Propaganda and mass persuasion : a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present. 1st ed. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, 2003. Print. **

//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Great source. Reference to film and propaganda. 3 pages. //

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Film (Feature) gives details about how film has developed from the beginning of the 1900s until around the 1940s. It tells it's original intents (for whom and for what). More importantly, this article sheds lights on its implications; one of which being that it"is a wonderful medium for the propagandist." It states that no matter how good or bad the film was, it's "loaded with cultural propaganda for the country or society that produced it." This is comparable to Birth of A Nation and Brave New World. Birth of a Nation is even listed here as one of the "Notorious examples" that "transformed moviegoing in America." The people that were anxious to see his film were described as "the respectable sort" that "flocked to see his brilliant achievement." The author however, dug deeper into the film and dubbed it a "deeply flawed masterpiece." The article went on to talk about Nazi Germany and WWII propaganda films.

Train of thought while reading this source:

-Birth of A Nation - over acting, 'soundless' film; bad movie in comparison to what we have today

-Much like the man in the feely, blacks were portrayed as if they "lacked intellectual ability"

-First time John had ever seen/experienced anything like this. Unlike "the respectable sort" he was not at all impressed by this (or any) innovation of the Brave new world. He was appalled by the "vicious film," and saw it as many black american southerners and NAACP member had upon viewing it. -Although nothing heroic was portrayed by the black man in the film, and he was portrayed much like the blacks in Birth of A Nation, JS saw him as a hero and identified him with Othello. Throughout the remainder of the novel, John quoted Othello, and seemed to identify with him, a man of color, mores than with the whites he was surrounded by and looked very much like. JS's way of seeing things when past caste and the color of a person's skin.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;"> Genetic Engineering <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;"> History – “bunk” or necessity? <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;"> Political Control techniques & motivations - Propaganda, Brainwashing [|2010-11-15 19.03.48.pdf] <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Civilization vs. Savagery (Savagery vs. Civilization | Black vs. White) <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Consumerism & Conditioning <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Class Consciousness & Sociology * Deltas versus Alphas versus Betas <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Psychology & Obedience * - Delta Riot <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Religion & religious experience <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;">Shakespeare - Othello

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;"> (Film as Racist Propaganda In a World That is Already Brainwashed to Be Caste-Conscious)

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 140%;"> The importance of the feely film's content that was portrayed in Brave New World, shines light on the fact that although Huxley's imaginary world does not seem racist on the surface, closer examination of the text suggests otherwise. Written in 1932, it is important to take note of all of the recent technological advances that Huxley was well aware of. In Brave New World Revisited, Huxley went back to comment on how films had developed to the point at which subliminal messages could be inserted so that the subconscious mind of the viewer would be more deeply effected, emotionally. Huxley says that this may "enhance the entertainment value of films" and invoke viewers to "to feel strong emotions and therefore enjoy tragedies, thrillers, murder mysteries and tales of passion." (BNW Revisited)

Othello is a Shakespearean play about a black man that is married to a white woman. Othello, the black man, is in charge, and has power over numerous white people. One of his closest officers betrays him, and successfully tricks him into thinking that his white wife is a “whore” or “strumpet.” Othello is referenced many times by John Savage in Brave New World. John refers to him as a hero, although the Shakespearean play ends tragically. Othello’s wife, Desdemona, can be paralleled with Lenina in some respects. However, John Savage is more easily paralleled with Othello, seeing as that John seems to identify with the character. The most important parallel can be made between Othello and the “ gigantic negro” described in Chapter 11 of Brave New World. (SN: Lenina is much like the “golden-haired young brachycephalic Beta-Plus female” and seems to identify with her.)

Brave New World Revisited It should be possible, according to an enterprising commercial group in New Orleans, to enhance the entertainment value of films and television plays by using this technique. People like to feel strong emotions and therefore enjoy tragedies, thrillers, murder mysteries and tales of passion. The dramatization of a fight or an embrace produces strong emotions in the spectators. It might produce even stronger emotions if it were associated, on the subconscious level, with appropriate words or symbols. For example, in the film version of //A Farewell to Arms//, the death of the heroine in childbirth might be made even more distressing than it already is by subliminally flashing upon the screen, again and again, during the playing of the scene, such ominous words as "pain," "blood" and "death." Consciously, the words would not be seen; but their effect upon the subconscious mind might be very great and these effects might powerfully reinforce the emotions evoked, on the conscious level, by the acting and the dialogue. If, as seems pretty certain, subliminal projec tion can consistently intensify the emotions felt by moviegoers, the motion picture industry may yet be saved from bankruptcy -- that is, if the producers of television plays don't get there first. --- Poetzl was one of the portents which, when writing //Brave New World//, I somehow overlooked. There is no reference in my fable to subliminal projection. It is a mistake of omission which, if I were to rewrite the book today, I should most certainly correct.

**The Good Lynching and The Birth of a Nation: Discourses and Aesthetics of Jim Crow,** **Michele Faith Wallace**


 * The most significant case in point is D. W Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915), a masterpiece of the silent era yet widely viewed as anti-black propaganda. This film's continued notoriety challenges all our most beloved notions of the intrinsically moral character of aesthetic masterpieces. **
 * It would be one thing if The Birth of a Nation were merely the best of a thousand or even a hundred similarly racist or similarly virulent films and therefore represented a larger trend in silent film production. But as far as we know, it is the only historical epic focused on the fear of so-called Negro domination in the Reconstruction era. **
 * From its first appearance, Birth inspired controversy and violent feelings in both its adherents and its detractors, and it continues to do so.4As such, Birth is a fascinating polemic, the analysis of which I like to think will expose the soft underbelly of an unfathomable conundrum that remains at the heart of the future of cinema studies: why does academic discussion of this film remain so endlessly important and yet so hopelessly inadequate to the task of ameliorating the textual racism this discussion seeks to diagnose? **

Othello, William Shakespeare: (Excerpt from Act 3, Scene 2: A room in a castle. Source: http://shakespeare.mit.edu/othello/index.html and associated links - unsure of how to cite)

Alas, what ignorant sin have I committed? Was this fair paper, this most goodly book, Made to write 'whore' upon? What committed! Committed! O thou public commoner! I should make very forges of my cheeks, That would to cinders burn up modesty, Did I but speak thy deeds. What committed! Heaven stops the nose at it and the moon winks, The bawdy wind that kisses all it meets Is hush'd within the hollow mine of earth, And will not hear it. What committed! Impudent strumpet!
 * DESDEMONA **
 * OTHELLO **

A few things that got me thinking:

<span style="color: #808080; font-family: 'lucida grande',tahoma,verdana,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal;">media type="youtube" key="iQ7mmMe4klQ?fs=1" height="385" width="480"

<span style="color: #808080; font-family: 'lucida grande',tahoma,verdana,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal;">John is somewhat like a Sara Baartman in that he came to a new land seeking one thing (to meet his father, to gain knowledge about the wonderful place his mother had been telling him about all those years. <span style="color: #808080; font-family: 'lucida grande',tahoma,verdana,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal;">However, once he arrived, he found himself in a world full of strange, emotionless, people; and, he became their spectacle. Throughout the novel, John Savage finds himself identifying with many of the main characters in Shakespeare's plays. The most important of which was Othello, a black man . . . (add more). Calls Lenina "strumpet" and whore, etc. (Chapter 13) Refers to black man in feely as "hero." (Chapter 11) Hangs himself like a tragic hero in the end of the novel (Chapter 18?)

Use this as reference: http://shakespeare.mit.edu/othello/full.html

<span style="color: #808080; font-family: 'lucida grande',tahoma,verdana,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal;">[|Is Serena Williams the new Sarah Baartman?]

Chapter 11 The house lights went down; fiery letters stood out solid and as though self-supported in the darkness. THREE WEEKS IN A HELICOPTER. AN ALL-SUPER-SINGING, SYNTHETIC-TALK1NG, COLOURED, STEREOSCOPIC FEELY. WITH SYNCHRONIZED SCENT-ORGAN ACCOMPANIMENT."Take hold of those metal knobs on the arms of your chair," whispered Lenina. "Otherwise you won't get any of the feely effects." The Savage did as he was told. ** [obedience] ** Those fiery letters, meanwhile, had disappeared; there were ten seconds of complete darkness; then suddenly, dazzling and incomparably more solid-looking than they would have seemed in actual flesh and blood, far more real than reality, there stood the stereoscopic images, locked in one another's arms, of a gigantic negro and a golden-haired young brachycephalic Beta-Plus female. ** [gigantic negro was not given a caste classification -- like [|Washing Amazons.pdf], less than human] ** The Savage started. That sensation on his lips! He lifted a hand to his mouth; the titillation ceased; let his hand fall back on the metal knob; it began again. The scent organ, meanwhile, breathed pure musk. Expiringly, a sound-track super-dove cooed "Oo-ooh"; and vibrating only thirty-two times a second, a deeper than __African bass__ made answer: "Aa-aah." "Ooh-ah! Ooh-ah!" ** [monkey noises - again almost like the 'gigantic negro' was an ape -- debased; not human] ** the stereoscopic lips came together again, and once more the facial erogenous zones of the six thousand __spectators__ in the **Alhambra** tingled with almost intolerable galvanic pleasure. "Ooh …" The plot of the film was extremely simple. A few minutes after the first Oohs and Aahs (a duet having been sung and a little love made on that famous bearskin, every hair of which–the Assistant Predestinator was perfectly right–could be separately and distinctly felt), the negro had a helicopter accident, fell on his head. Thump! what a twinge through the forehead! A chorus of ow's and aie's went up from the audience.The concussion knocked all the negro's conditioning into a cocked hat. He developed for the Beta blonde an exclusive and maniacal passion. She protested. He persisted. There were struggles, pursuits, an assault on a rival, finally a sensational kidnapping. The Beta blond was ravished away into the sky and kept there, hovering, for three weeks in a wildly anti-social tête-à-tête with the black madman. Finally, after a whole series of adventures and much aerial acrobacy three handsome young Alphas succeeded in rescuing her. The negro was packed off to an Adult Re-conditioning Centre and the film ended happily and decorously, with the Beta blonde becoming the mistress of all her three rescuers. They interrupted themselves for a moment to sing a synthetic quartet, with full super-orchestral accompaniment and gardenias on the scent organ. Then the bearskin made a final appearance and, amid a blare of saxophones, the last stereoscopic kiss faded into darkness, the last electric titillation died on the lips like a dying moth that quivers, quivers, ever more feebly, ever more faintly, and at last is quiet, quite still. But for Lenina the moth did not completely die. Even after the lights had gone up, while they were shuffling slowly along with the crowd towards the lifts, its ghost still fluttered against her lips, still traced fine shuddering roads of anxiety and pleasure across her skin. Her cheeks were flushed. She caught hold of the Savage's arm and pressed it, limp, against her side. He looked down at her for a moment, pale, pained, desiring, and ashamed of his desire. He was not worthy, not … Their eyes for a moment met. What treasures hers promised! A queen's ransom of temperament. Hastily he looked away, disengaged his imprisoned arm. He was obscurely terrified lest she should cease to be something he could feel himself unworthy of.

<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: small; line-height: 15px;"> **__//tête-à-tête -//__** Without the intrusion of a third person; in intimate privacy Link Birth of a Nation reference in: <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: normal; white-space: nowrap;">Propaganda and mass persuasion: a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present

**The Alhambra** was a popular theatre and [|music hall] located on the east side of [|Leicester Square], in the [|West End] of [|London].

Chapter 11 (continued) And, in effect, eighty-three **almost noseless __black__ brachycephalic Deltas** were cold-pressing. The fifty-six four-spindle chucking and turning machines were being manipulated by fifty-six aquiline and ginger Gammas. One hundred and seven heat-conditioned Epsilon Senegalese were working in the foundry. **Thirty-three Delta females, long-headed, sandy, with narrow pelvises, and all within 20 millimetres of 1 metre 69 centimetres tall**, were cutting screws. In the assembling room, the dynamos were being put together by two sets of Gamma-Plus dwarfs. The two low work-tables faced one another; between them crawled the conveyor with its load of separate parts; forty-seven blonde heads were confronted by forty-seven brown ones. Forty-seven snubs by forty-seven hooks; forty-seven receding by forty-seven prognathous chins. The completed mechanisms were inspected by eighteen identical curly auburn girls in Gamma green, packed in crates by thirty-four short-legged, left-handed male Delta-Minuses, and loaded into the waiting trucks and lorries by sixty-three blue-eyed, flaxen and freckled Epsilon Semi-Morons.

Deltas (assumably Delta males) have black (brown) skin and short heads. Delta females have black/unknown skin tone, long heads and 'yellowish-red' hair. (If all Deltas are black/dark skinned - Deltas may well look like aborigines).

**brachycephalic -** <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 17px; line-height: 20px;">Short-headed: used in //Ethnol.// to denote skulls of which the breadth is at least four-fifths of the length: opposed to DOLICHOCEPHALIC. aquiline - eagle-like sandy - <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 17px; line-height: 20px;"> **2.** //fig.// Resembling sand as lacking the quality of cohesion or stability. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 17px; line-height: 20px;"> **3.** Having hair of a yellowish-red colour; of hair, yellowish-red.

Chapter 8 . There were three women in dark blankets. Linda was on the bed. One of the women was holding her wrists. Another was lying across her legs, so that she couldn't kick. The third was hitting her with a whip. Once, twice, three times; and each time Linda screamed. Crying, he tugged at the fringe of the woman's blanket. "Please, please." With her free hand she held him away. The whip came down again, and again Linda screamed. He caught hold of **the woman's enormous brown hand** between his own and bit it with all his might. She cried out, wrenched her hand free, and gave him such a push that he fell down. While he was lying on the ground she hit him three times with the whip. It hurt more than anything he had ever felt–like fire. The whip whistled again, fell. But this time it was Linda who screamed.

Chapter 7

word "black" used 8 times. black skin, hair, snakes, nails.

"Like the Charing-T Tower," was Lenina's comment. But she was not allowed to enjoy her discovery of this reassuring resemblance for long. A padding of soft feet made them turn round. **Naked from throat to navel, their dark brown bodies painted with white lines** ("like asphalt tennis courts," Lenina was later to explain), **their faces __inhuman__ with daubings of scarlet, black and ochre, two Indians came running along the path.** Their __black hair was braided__ with fox fur and red flannel. Cloaks of turkey feathers fluttered from their shoulders; huge feather diadems exploded gaudily round their heads. With every step they took came the clink and rattle of their silver bracelets, their heavy necklaces of bone and turquoise beads. They came on without a word, running quietly in their deerskin moccasins. One of them was holding a feather brush; the other carried, in either hand, what looked at a distance like three or four pieces of thick rope. One of the ropes writhed uneasily, and suddenly Lenina saw that they were snakes.

The men came nearer and nearer; **their dark eyes looked at her [Lenina]**, but without giving any sign of recognition, any smallest sign that they had seen her or were aware of her existence. The writhing snake hung limp again with the rest. The men passed.

ochre (ocher) - an earthy pigment containing ferric oxide, typically with clay, varying from light yellow to brown or red.

<span style="display: block; font-size: medium ! important; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="MS" style="display: block; font-size: medium ! important;"><span class="lbl" style="cursor: text; font-family: LucidaGrande; font-size: medium ! important;">• <span class="def" style="cursor: text; font-size: medium ! important; font-weight: normal;">a pale brownish yellow color

<span style="display: block; font-size: medium ! important; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="MS" style="display: block; font-size: medium ! important;"> An almost naked Indian was very slowly climbing down the ladder from the first-floor terrace of a neighboring house–rung after rung, with the tremulous caution of extreme old age. __His face was__ profoundly **wrinkled and black, like a mask of obsidian**. The toothless mouth had fallen in. At the corners of the lips, and on each side of the chin, a few long bristles gleamed almost white against **the dark skin**. The long unbraided hair hung down in grey wisps round his face. His body was bent and emaciated to the bone, almost fleshless. Very slowly he came down, pausing at each rung before he ventured another step.

They stepped across the threshold and found themselves on a wide terrace. Below them, shut in by the tall houses, was the village square, crowded with Indians. **Bright blankets, and feathers in black hair, and the glint of turquoise, and dark skins shining with heat.** Lenina put her handkerchief to her nose again. In the open space at the centre of the square were two circular platforms of masonry and trampled clay–the roofs, it was evident, of underground chambers; for in the centre of each platform was an open hatchway, with a ladder **emerging from the lower darkness**. A sound of subterranean flute playing came up and was almost lost in the steady remorseless persistence of the drums.

Chapter 5

Lenina and Henry climbed into their machine and started off. At eight hundred feet Henry slowed down the helicopter screws, and they hung for a minute or two poised above the fading landscape. The forest of Burnham Beeches stretched like a great pool of darkness towards the bright shore of the western sky. Crimson at the horizon, the last of the sunset faded, through orange, upwards into yellow and a pale watery green. Northwards, beyond and above the trees, the Internal and External Secretions factory glared with a fierce electric brilliance from every window of its twenty stories. Beneath them lay the buildings of the Golf Club–the huge Lower Caste barracks and, on the other side of a dividing wall, the smaller houses reserved for Alpha and Beta members. **The approaches to the monorail station were __black__ with the ant-like pullulation of lower-caste activity.** From under the glass vault a lighted train shot out into the open. Following its southeasterly course across the dark plain their eyes were drawn to the majestic buildings of the Slough Crematorium. For the safety of night-flying planes, its four tall chimneys were flood-lighted and tipped with crimson danger signals. It was a landmark.

Clothing and or skin reference. Epsilons wear black/Deltas have black(dark) skin.

Chapter 4
 * The liftman was a small simian creature, dressed in the black tunic of an Epsilon-Minus Semi-Moron.**


 * "Roof!"**

He flung open the gates. The warm glory of afternoon sunlight made him __start and blink his eyes__. **"Oh, roof!" he repeated in a voice of rapture. He was as though suddenly and joyfully awakened from a __dark annihilating stupor.__ "Roof!"**

He smiled up with a kind of __doggily expectant adoration__ into the faces of his passengers. Talking and laughing together, they stepped out into the light. The liftman looked after them.


 * "Roof?" he said once more, questioningly.**

Then a bell rang, and from the ceiling of the lift a loud speaker began, very softly and yet very imperiously, to issue its commands.

"Go down," it said, "go down. Floor Eighteen. Go down, go down. Floor Eighteen. Go down, go …"

The liftman slammed the gates, **touched a button and instantly dropped back into the droning twilight of the well, the twilight of his own habitual stupor.** simian - relating to, resembling, or affecting apes or monkeys.

**Epsilon-Minus Semi-Moron.** Small, monkey-like ( his growth was stunted ) **dressed in the black tunic** __dark annihilating stupor. \__ **habitual stupor.** **Now sense of memory [****"Roof?" he said once more, questioningly.]** **Admires those of higher caste - more than likely in conditioning - [** smiled up with a kind of __doggily expectant adoration__ into the faces of his passengers **]**

Chapter 2"… all wear green," said a soft but very distinct voice, beginning in the middle of a sentence, "and Delta Children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides **they wear black, which is such a beastly colour**. I'm //so// glad I'm a Beta."

There was a pause; then the voice began again.

"Alpha children wear grey They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm really awfuly glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I //don't// want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able …"

The color black given to a low caste and seen as "such a beastly colour" by Betas (a high caste). Black is a synonym for the phrase "African-American." Psychological studies done in black children in the 1900s showed that they themselves thought black was ugly, filthy, and bad; and white a good, clean and pure. This is comparable to the conditioning done in "Brave New World." The American South's society conditioned both black and white children, although separately, that black was of lower worth than white. Lead into Propaganda.

Chapter 1

"Sixteen thousand and twelve in this Centre," Mr. Foster replied without hesitation. He spoke very quickly, had a vivacious blue eye, and took an evident pleasure in quoting figures. "Sixteen thousand and twelve; in one hundred and eighty-nine batches of identicals. But of course they've done much better," he rattled on, "in some of the tropical Centres. __Singapore__ has often produced over sixteen thousand five hundred; and **__Mombasa__** has actually touched the seventeen thousand mark. **But then they have unfair advantages.** You should see the way a **negro ovary** responds to pituitary! It's quite astonishing, when you're used to working with **European** material. Still," he added, with a laugh (but the __light of combat__ was in his eyes and the lift of his chin was __challenging__), "still, we mean to beat them if we can. I'm working on a wonderful Delta-Minus ovary at this moment. Only just eighteen months old. Over twelve thousand seven hundred children already, either decanted or in embryo. And still going strong. **We'll beat them yet.**" "That's the spirit I like!" cried the Director, and clapped Mr. Foster on the shoulder.

There is a since of racial awareness and European or even white pride displayed here, in the first chapter of the novel. Mention of unfair advantages of the "tropical centres" in Singapore and Mombasa (in Kenya, Africa) suggests a sense of white competitiveness towards other races (especially since they have been proven genetically superior).

The fact that Mr. Foster differentiated the "negro ovary" from the "European material" he was used to working with, shows that he was well aware of the racial differences, and that there had been discovery of a biological superiority of the "negro." Although this was acknowledged, it was done so briefly; because, just one sentence later, a keen sense of race related competition was sparked. Foster's "light of combat" that shone in his eyes was proof that Huxley wanted to portray race relations as almost war-like, as many Americans would consider them to be in the American South during this time and after. "We'll beat them yet," was another interesting phrase when the history of slavery and Reconstruction in the American South is considered. Triangular Trade would not have been possible without the slaves ships from England. History is known to repeat itself when the masses have no knowledge of the treacheries of the past.

Using ASC, I came across a New York Times article from 1991, entitled "<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Tahoma,Verdana,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">PROPAGANDA FILMS; Politically Correct, Morally Wrong." Unfortunately, the full version of this article was not available. But, I was able to find a book by the articles author that both pertained to my search of "propaganda" and mentions "Birth of A Nation." This book is called, <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: normal; white-space: nowrap;">Propaganda and mass persuasion: a historical encyclopedia, 1500 to the present and it is currently available in our library.

Book was in reference section; took photos with camera on phone.

Here is a JSTOR article

**Abstract: The Birth of a Nation (1915) is a landmark in the development of the feature film and in the history of American racial discourse in the Jim Crow pe- riod. This article proposes that the correctivefor our current perspective on The** **Birth of a Nation is that we more thoroughly study how the techniques offeature film inscribe and underwrite dominant racial ideologies.**

**Recent research on silent film has tended to focus on the technological and formal aspects of the medium and not, for the most part, on its narrativecontent. Scholarshave seemed to suggest that the silent film narrativeis predictable, for- mulaic, and therefore of little intellectual interest.'**

After looking somewhat into the Ben Franklin article, I have found that this is probably not the direction I want to take my paper. I couldn't find a way to relate his view of Native Americans to race relations. Chapter 11 in Brave New World ends with John Savage and Lenina's date. I wanted to use the content of the feely film they saw and propaganda such as the film Birth of A Nation and it's effects of Southern whites. I wanted to compare John and Lenina's reaction to the reactions of blacks and mainstream Southern whites, respectively. An article from my history class, called Fighting a Vicious Film (on Kindle; link now below), could be used as a source here.



Another useful source could be Brave New World Revisited, chapters on Propaganda in Democracy and Dictatorship. Plan to watch specific scenes of Birth of A Nation. Other films, more recent.

This is the link to the Ben Franklin article.

He stood for a long time outside the house, and at last the ceremonies within were finished. The door opened; they came out. Kothlu came first, his right hand out-stretched and tightly closed, as though over some precious jewel. Her clenched hand similarly outstretched, Kiakimé followed. They walked in silence, and in silence, behind them, came the brothers and sisters and cousins and all the troop of old people.

They walked out of the pueblo, across the mesa. At the edge of the cliff they halted, facing the early morning sun. Kothlu opened his hand. A pinch of corn meal lay white on the palm; he breathed on it, murmured a few words, then threw it, a handful of white dust, towards the sun. Kiakimé did the same. Then Khakimé's father stepped forward, and holding up a feathered prayer stick, made a long prayer, then threw the stick after the corn meal.

"It is finished," said old Mitsima in a loud voice. "They are married."

"Well," said Linda, as they turned away, "all I can say is, it does seem a lot of fuss to make about so little. In civilized countries, when a boy wants to have a girl, he just … But where //are// you going, John?"

He paid no attention to her calling, but ran on, away, away, anywhere to be by himself.

It is finished Old Mitsima's words repeated themselves in his mind. Finished, finished … In silence and from a long way off, but violently, desperately, hopelessly, he had loved Kiakimé. And now it was finished. He was sixteen.

**EXCERPT RELATING TO DOCUMENT**

At the full moon, in the Antelope Kiva, secrets would be told, secrets would be done and borne. They would go down, boys, into the kiva and come out again, men. The boys were all afraid and at the same time impatient. And at last it was the day. The sun went down, the moon rose. He went with the others. Men were standing, dark, at the entrance to the kiva; the ladder went down into the red lighted depths. Already the leading boys had begun to climb down. Suddenly, one of the men stepped forward, caught him by the arm, and pulled him out of the ranks. He broke free and dodged back into his place among the others. This time the man struck him, pulled his hair. "Not for you, white-hair!" "Not for the son of the she-dog," said one of the other men. The boys laughed. "Go!" And as he still hovered on the fringes of the group, "Go!" the men shouted again. One of them bent down, took a stone, threw it. "Go, go, go!" There was a shower of stones. Bleeding, he ran away into the darkness. From the red-lit kiva came the noise of singing. The last of the boys had climbed down the ladder. He was all alone. All alone, outside the pueblo, on the bare plain of the mesa. The rock was like bleached bones in the moonlight. Down in the valley, the coyotes were howling at the moon. The bruises hurt him, the cuts were still bleeding; but it was not for pain that he sobbed; it was because he was all alone, because he had been driven out, alone, into this skeleton world of rocks and moonlight. At the edge of the precipice he sat down. The moon was behind him; he looked down into the black shadow of the mesa, into the black shadow of death. He had only to take one step, one little jump. … He held out his right hand in the moonlight. From the cut on his wrist the blood was still oozing. Every few seconds a drop fell, dark, almost colourless in the dead light. Drop, drop, drop. To-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow …He had discovered Time and Death and God.


 * CLASSWORK EXCERPT**

But a little later it was reminding her a good deal less of that innocuous function. For suddenly there had swarmed up from those round chambers underground a ghastly troop of monsters. Hideously masked or painted out of all semblance of humanity, they had tramped out a strange limping dance round the square; round and again round, singing as they went, round and round–each time a little faster; and the drums had changed and quickened their rhythm, so that it became like the pulsing of fever in the ears; and the crowd had begun to sing with the dancers, louder and louder; and first one woman had shrieked, and then another and another, as though they were being killed; and then suddenly the leader of the dancers broke out of the line, ran to a big wooden chest which was standing at one end of the square, raised the lid and pulled out a pair of black snakes. A great yell went up from the crowd, and all the other dancers ran towards him with out-stretched hands. He tossed the snakes to the first-comers, then dipped back into the chest for more. More and more, black snakes and brown and mottled-he flung them out. And then the dance began again on a different rhythm. Round and round they went with their snakes, snakily, with a soft undulating movement at the knees and hips. Round and round. Then the leader gave a signal, and one after another, all the snakes were flung down in the middle of the square; an old man came up from underground and sprinkled them with corn meal, and from the other hatchway came a woman and sprinkled them with water from a black jar. Then the old man lifted his hand and, startlingly, terrifyingly, there was absolute silence. The drums stopped beating, life seemed to have come to an end. The old man pointed towards the two hatchways that gave entrance to the lower world. And slowly, raised by invisible hands from below, there emerged from the one a painted image of an eagle, from the other that of a man, naked, and nailed to a cross. They hung there, seemingly self-sustained, as though watching. The old man clapped his hands. Naked but for a white cotton breech-cloth, a boy of about eighteen stepped out of the crowd and stood before him, his hands crossed over his chest, his head bowed. The old man made the sign of the cross over him and turned away. Slowly, the boy began to walk round the writhing heap of snakes. He had completed the first circuit and was half-way through the second when, from among the dancers, a tall man wearing the mask of a coyote and holding in his hand a whip of plaited leather, advanced towards him. The boy moved on as though unaware of the other's existence. The coyote-man raised his whip, there was a long moment of expectancy, then a swift movement, the whistle of the lash and its loud flat-sounding impact on the flesh. The boy's body quivered; but he made no sound, he walked on at the same slow, steady pace. The coyote struck again, again; and at every blow at first a gasp, and then a deep groan went up from the crowd. The boy walked. Twice, thrice, four times round he went. The blood was streaming. Five times round, six times round. Suddenly Lenina covered her face shish her hands and began to sob. "Oh, stop them, stop them!" she implored. But the whip fell and fell inexorably. Seven times round. Then all at once the boy staggered and, still without a sound, pitched forward on to his face. Bending over him, the old man touched his back with a long white feather, held it up for a moment, crimson, for the people to see then shook it thrice over the snakes. A few drops fell, and suddenly the drums broke out again into a panic of hurrying notes; there was a great shout. The dancers rushed forward, picked up the snakes and ran out of the square. Men, women, children, all the crowd ran after them. A minute later the square was empty, only the boy remained, prone where he had fallen, quite still. Three old women came out of one of the houses, and with some difficulty lifted him and carried him in. The eagle and the man on the cross kept guard for a little while over the empty pueblo; then, as though they had seen enough, sank slowly down through their hatchways, out of sight, into the nether world.

While reading Chapter 7 of "Brave New World" for this class, and Timothy B. Tyson's "Blood Done Sign My Name," for another class, it came to my mind to talk about race relationships in respect to the "savages" and the "civilized" (in Huxley's novel) and blacks and whites in the South (in "Blood Done Sign My Name.") Seeing as that the Reservation is set in America, and Huxley's book was written in the 1930s, it can be readily compared with race relations in the American South between white Southerners and African Americans (with regard to: white supremacism and paternalism towards blacks). This idea will be further developed, however, ideas for sources would be: Blood Done Sign My Name, by Timothy B. Tyson; and, Coming of Age in Mississippi, by Anne Moody.